1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a terminal attached to a flat conductor of a flat circuitry such as FPC (Flexible Print Circuit) and FFC (Flexible Flat Cable), and the flat circuitry having the terminal.
2. Description of the Related Art
A motor vehicle is equipped with a variety of electronic devices. The motor vehicle includes a wire harness for supplying electric power of a battery and control signal of a controller to the electronic devices. The wire harness has an electric wire and a connector. The connector has a housing formed with a synthetic resin and a terminal connected with an end portion of the electric wire.
The electronic devices mounted in the motor vehicle has been increasing in accordance with multi-functions requested by users. Accordingly, the wire harness has also been increasing in mass and volume.
In order to make the wire harness smaller, the flat circuitry such as FFC and FPC is proposed as the electric wire. The flat circuitry has a conductor of a rectangle section and a clad portion covering the conductor. The flat circuitry has the plurality of the conductors extending in parallel each other and the conductors are each insulated with the clad portion.
EP1363362 discloses that when a terminal is connected to a conductor of a flat circuitry, the conductor is bent to match with a shape of the terminal and the terminal is connected to the conductor. JP,2002-334733,A discloses that a conductor is placed on a bottom wall of a terminal having a pair of crimping pieces upstanding at both ends of the bottom wall and electric connection portions are bent to crimp the conductor.
A method of connecting the terminal to the conductor disclosed in EP1363362 requires a metal mold to form the conductor so as to match the shape of the terminal, and a metal mold for crimping the terminal to the conductor. Accordingly, a cost of connecting the terminal tends to increase.
The electric connection portion disclosed in JP,2002-334733,A can not be matched with the flat conductor due to the flat shape contrary to the case of twisted electric wires. Then, a contact area between the conductor and the electric connection portion decreases and an electric contact failure easily occurs. The electric connection portion has usually the crimping pieces, end portions of which are widely opened up to easily accept the conductor. This causes a difficulty for the crimping pieces to deform at a prescribed position when the conductor is crimped with a crimping device. Accordingly, the conductor is not well crimped as a specification so that the contact failure occurs due to an weak crimping force. Since the end portions of the crimping pieces are widely opened up, the conductor is easily displaced against the electric connection portion and possibly left therefrom during crimping.